164 IRRIGATION. 



But the irrigation of lands of the character under con- 

 sideration, can only be profitably undertaken by the com- 

 bined effort of a community. The necessary engineering 

 works, such as dams, canals, sluices, water-ways, and 

 aqueducts, can only be constructed by means of ample 

 capital, and for the use of numerous farmers, cultivating 

 in the aggregate many thousands of acres. In such cases, 

 the total cost divided among the farms to be irrigated, 

 would leave for each one a sum far less than that needed 

 to clear a farm of equal size from the forest. The actual 

 cost of irrigating works of a permanent character, has 

 been found to range from so small a sum as $1 per acre, 

 upward. That is, a community of farmers, numbering 

 some hundreds, may construct the necessary dams, canals, 

 sluices and feed-gates to irrigate 10,000 to 50,000 acres of 

 land, at a total cost not to exceed $5 per acre, where the 

 conditions of water supply, character of soil, and surface 

 of the land are favorable. To clear an acre of average 

 timber land, will cost $12 to $25 per acre, and the money 

 value of the damage incurred annually, by reason of the 

 stumps and roots which interfere with cultivation, until 

 they have rotted away or have been removed with infinite 

 labor, may easily amount to $20 per acre more. To irri- 

 gate a farm permanently, may then cost but one-eighth 

 of the sum necessary to clear it of timber. This estimate 

 will allow of substantially constructed works, which will 

 require but little repair, or renewal, to keep them in per- 

 manently good condition. Large tracts of land have been 

 supplied with water for irrigation, at a much less cost 

 than this, in some cases even so low as 25 to 50 cents per 

 acre ; but this cost covers only the construction of the 

 main supply ditch, and not the interior ditches, which, to 

 be permanent, should be well laid out, and properly con- 

 structed. It has been sufficiently well shown, however, 

 that a supply of water for irrigation can be brought to 

 and spread over a farm upon our dry plains, at a total ex- 



